Ichthyophobia
by mangaluva
Summary: Hakuba discovers Kaito's greatest fear, but chooses the worst time to exploit it, leading to a strange reaction from Kaito... more than a bit crackish. Oneshot.


_**Ichthyophobia**_

Another day, another mop chase.

It had already been underway by the time that Saguru had reached the classroom (_How_ was Kuroba so awake and peppy so early in the morning? After Saguru had chased him across Tokyo until _three o' clock this morning?_!), so he wasn't sure how it had started, but he felt that he could reasonably assume that it had involved skirt-flipping or some other form of molestation, judging by the shade of red that Aoko was. Kuroba's frequent lewd comments as he effortlessly dodged the dangerous cleaning implement probably weren't helping.

"Dare I ask?" He muttered to Akako as he set his bag down, stifling a yawn.

"Allow some things in this world to remain a mystery, Meitantei," she said, idly reading a gossip magazine and occasionally laughing nastily at the adverts for psychic hotlines.

"Mornin', Hakuba!"

Saguru coughed as he was enveloped in smoke. There was an uncomfortably cold sensation for a moment, before an even more uncomfortable tight feeling. Waving the smoke away and coughing, he suspected that Kuroba had done something more than simply dye his hair (the usual favourite) when the class suddenly erupted into shrieks and giggles.

He glanced down at himself with a sigh and a flush. He was wearing the girl's uniform.

"You have ten seconds to give me my uniform, Kuroba," he growled as he stalked the laughing thief, feeling his face rapidly heat up as giggles and sniggers began to spill over into full-blown laughter. "Correction- Eight point three four."

"But you look so lovely!" the idiot hooted, leaping over a desk backwards as he fled from the furious Brit. "You've got _fabulous_ legs…"

"Five point one seven."

"That's _it_, Kaito," Aoko seethed, reaching into her bag. "You asked for this…" she flung something at Kaito. Saguru expected him to dodge it as effortlessly as the mop, but he suddenly paled to a sickly greyish pallor, his eyes widening until they almost seemed to bug out of his head, and with a terrified (and quite entertainingly feminine) shriek, he leapt away, clearing two desks as he attempted to transcend matter and pass through the wall into the next classroom. Or possibly, if the desperation of his struggles was any indication, the next prefecture.

"Take it, take it!" he wailed as the entire class stared, shocked to see the easygoing boy so terrified. This was an unprecedented reaction from Kuroba. "I'm sorry! Forgive me! _Just make it go away!!!!_" He tossed Saguru's uniform across the room, scrambling into the top corner between the wall and the ceiling in an attempt to escape whatever had caused his fear. Aoko strode forwards with a triumphant grin, scooping up whatever it was and Saguru's uniform, placing the former in her bag (the color instantly returned to Kuroba's face, although the grin did not, as he now seemed scared of Aoko's bag simply for containing the source of his fear) and passing the latter to Saguru.

"Sorry about that, Hakuba-kun," she said. "Um… you might want to go get changed now. Everyone's coming out of shock and I know for a fact that Keiko has a camera on her phone." Saguru fled, endeavouring to pass the other students in the hallway so fast that they wouldn't see him.

"Hey, this is the _guy's_- oh, Hakuba," a guy said as Saguru burst into the bathroom. "Ummm… should we ask?"

"I think Kuroba's murder will go unsolved," he snapped as he made for a stall. The skirt was uncomfortably drafty.

"Ahh," the guy sniggered. A couple of first-years continued staring in confusion, and as Saguru slammed the stall door behind him he heard his classmate embarking on an explanation of why all bizarre happenings at the school- and possibly in the world at large- were generally caused by Kuroba Kaito.

"_That thief will pay,_" he fumed, feeling considerably more comfortable as he got back into the boy's uniform. "_I will torment and punish him… Maybe I should ask Koizumi-san about curses… or…_" he frowned thoughtfully. "_What on earth terrified him so? What did Nakamori-san throw at him? I only saw a flash of red, it must have been very small… but he was clearly terrified… I think it may have been moving, too… hmm. Prospects for Kid-torture. This is now a priority investigation._" He checked the label of the girl's uniform as he folded it up and flushed. Kami above, Kuroba had not only put him in a girl's uniform but _Aoko's_ spare uniform…

Still, once he'd returned the uniform to Nakamori-san, a mop chase ought to initiate, giving him long enough to investigate what Aoko had in her bag that Kuroba was so scared of… or maybe she'd throw it at him again…

xXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx

A week later, Saguru had still not located the source of Kuroba's mysterious fear. Aoko had refused to tell him, stating that "it really does terrify him for some reason, so I don't think I'll spread it around… just keep it in reserve…" and Kuroba, while returning to his usual pranks, had kept them light to avoid incurring Aoko's ultimate wrath, and had been carefully avoiding terrorizing Saguru at all. Another heist was coming up, and Saguru really, _really_ wanted to take the chance to torment Kuroba and prove who he was once and for all…

However, something else quickly became more important. That was the fact that he kept noticing Momoi Keiko showing somebody a picture on her phone, which tended to result in people staring at him and giggling.

"You can't hide it forever, Momoi-san," he said, sneaking up behind her and yanking her phone from her grasp, causing the girl to break off mid-giggle and shriek.

"Um, Hakuba-kun, you know, it's really rude to…" she babbled, reaching for her phone, but she was too late to stop him seeing the photo of himself stalking Kuroba. Unfortunately, the uniform and the pose she'd caught him in really _did_ make him look like a girl. Kuroba was visible in the top corner of the photo, forgetting entirely about gravity in his haste to get away. And at the bottom of the photo, lying where it had been obscured from Saguru by a desk but visible past the chair legs was…

"_Well, well,_" Saguru said, raising an eyebrow. "_To think Kuroba has such an odd fear. Well, don't look a gift horse in the mouth… I guess I'll need to stop by that toy shop on the corner before the heist tonight…_"

xXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx

Kaito was slightly worried. The heist had gone off without a hitch, mainly because neither tantei-kun nor Hakuba had been present. The former, he'd found out when he was investigating (stalking) the boy, was in Izu with the Mori family, who had refused to cancel the weekend break just to attend a Kid heist, and as for Hakuba…

Maybe that was what worried him. Where the hell _was_ he? He'd spent all day yesterday smirking worryingly, which surely meant that he'd planned something for tonight, but Kaito hadn't seen him at all yet…

He jogged up the stairs to the helipad on the roof of the skyscraper, pulling the emerald out of his pocket. There was a nice full moon tonight, plenty of light, and it would take the cops a while to notice that he'd actually left the millionaire's suite as, given a puff of smoke and thirty seconds, he had dressed all of them (including Nakamori-keibu) in full replicas of his costume and a mask of his face. It had been easy enough to slip out of the room as they jumped on one another.

He opened the door to the roof, giving his eyes a second to adjust to the moonlight, staring up at the moon as he raised the jewel. It sparkled a beautiful green in the moonlight, although its beauty was dulled by the fact that it wasn't red. Damn.

"You're not getting away tonight, Kaitou Kid."

Kaito kept his signature smile in place as he glanced over at Hakuba, who had stepped out from the doorway after him. "Why shouldn't I, tantei-san? If it's the jewel you want, I'm afraid it does not suit my needs anyway…" he tossed it to Hakuba, intending to use his moment's distraction to leap off of the roof and fly away.

It was then that he realized what Hakuba had been doing all evening while Kaito had been wreaking merry hell downstairs.

Stuck on little posts, all around the edge of the rooftop, were little red plastic… _swimming things_, fluttering in the wind. There was one every foot or so, surrounding the rooftop. To get off the roof, he'd have to _jump over_ them…

It was a miracle of Poker Facing that he didn't twitch, although he was sure that he must have paled, and was thankful that the hat and monocle generally hid his face. He glanced over at the door, wondering if he could knock Hakuba out and leg it downstairs dressed as him.

There was a huge paper… _thing_ tacked to the back of the door.

"_This cannot be happening,_" he thought wildly, fighting to keep his Poker Face in place. "_The Kaitou Kid cannot be trapped by some f… some fi… finny things… the Kaitou Kid has no fears… but I do and, Kami help me, I can't go anywhere _near_ those… things… but I have to get out of here… I have to… if I show fear, Hakuba will know…_"

"What's wrong, Kid?" Hakuba asked, catching the jewel and tucking it into his coat. "Not running? I would have thought, your work done for tonight, you'd be on your way…"

Kaito looked around again, desperate to find some other way out of this predicament. It was a testament to just how scared he was of fish that he was _glad_ to see the man who stepped out from under the helipad.

"I have another meeting," he said calmly, focusing on _him_ and not those… scaly things. "_Think of him… think of Tou-san… do not, under any circumstances, think about _them…" "If you would be so polite as to leave to give Snake-kun and I some privacy…"

"Hold it, kid," Snake growled, raising his gun. Hakuba froze, as did Kaito. "_Crap… despite using all of those… things with gills… against me, I don't really think I want Hakuba's death on my conscience… lucky Snake's so incompetent… if he has superiors who insist on setting him on me, I will be very insulted…_"

"Do either of us really want a detective at close proximity, Snake-kun?" Kaito said lightly. "After all, do you really want the publicity? I don't mind, you know I adore the spotlight, but you and your fellow denizens seem to prefer the shadows…"

"Just give us the jewel, Toichi," Snake growled.

"I can't imagine that if I do, you will be so generous as to not shoot me," Kaito continued, though inwardly he was grimacing at the use of his father's name. "_OK, have I ever mentioned Tou-san to Hakuba? I know Aoko says that I never shut up about him- why would I? He was the best- but have I ever mentioned him to Hakuba?_"

"Of course not, but we might make it quick," Snake said mockingly. "_Might_."

"How kind," Kaito said icily, "But I think I'll pass."

"Right over to the other side," Snake sneered, firing. Kaito executed a dextrous backward flip to dodge, the elegance offset by the part where he landed ten inches away from one of the plastic fish and promptly tripped, trying not to scream. He saw Hakuba try to run for the door, calling for the police, but jerked back, hissing in pain as Snake shot him in the arm. Kaito started shooting at Snake with his card gun, trying to distract his attention away from Hakuba, but the pattern of the gunfight and his dodges kept sending him face-to-face with the fish, and soon it was all he could do just to dodge, never mind shoot straight. The fear just kept building…

Then it snapped.

xXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx

Saguru was starting to really regret his timing. A crazy killer had to come after Kuroba on the night that _he_ was tormenting him?

"_But then, from the way they talked, this isn't the first time, is it?_" he thought. "_They know each other… and that guy… Snake… why'd he call Kuroba "Toichi"? Kuroba… Toichi…?_" The name was ringing a tiny bell, but he mentally shook himself as Kuroba was unable to stop himself emitting a small shriek as he nearly dodged right into one of the plastic fish. "_This is not the time for that!_"

Unfortunately, he didn't have a gun, and Snake seemed to have completely forgotten him in his intent on killing Kuroba. Kuroba yelled again as he dodged a bullet and smacked right into one of the fish, his legs giving way as he collapsed. Saguru ran for him, intending to help, but then…

Another bullet was fired, and Kuroba _twisted_ oddly, flipping on his side and flying into the air with unusual force and landing in a handstand before Snake, his legs flipping around in an odd motion to knock Snake's gun out of his hand in a two-footed kick, a whiplash motion running through his body as he swung his legs back to kick Snake in the face in the opposite direction. Hakuba stared as Kuroba sprung through the air again, seeming to be possessed of more than his usual force and agility, and headbutted Snake hard enough to knock him out. He then did a handspring right over the body and over the edge, suddenly ignoring the fish. Saguru ran to the edge, staring down after him, but he was already soaring away on the hanglider, arms and legs outstretched. He wasn't sure what he expected to see- Kuroba was acting strange tonight, far stranger than usual.

He glanced around. Snake was unconscious. He quickly gathered up the fish, then ran to find a police officer to arrest Snake. But by the time they returned, Snake was gone.

xXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx

Kaito thumped his head down on his desk with a groan as the lunch bell rang. He was still wondering how the hell he'd gotten out of _that_ situation last night. The last thing he remembered was _scaly things_ everywhere, and gunshots, and…

"Hakuba-kun! What on earth happened?!"

"Oh, I ran into a mad criminal with a gun last night… lucky I got away with just this, really."

He glanced up. He'd wondered if he was coming in at all today. Then he saw the sling on Hakuba's arm.

Oh yeah, and Hakuba had gotten hurt. And heard Snake address him as "Toichi."

"You know, you never mentioned that you were related to _the _Kuroba Toichi, Master of Illusion," he said nonchalantly. Kaito cursed inwardly, while outwardly perking up a little- well, it was mostly known that he could go on forever about his father, as Aoko pointed out.

"I'm surprised he hasn't," she said. "He was his father… Kaito generally doesn't shut up about him."

"Why should I? He was the best," Kaito said loftily.

"It's certainly an odd coincidence, then," Hakuba murmured, so that only Kaito could hear. "And unless you're willing to take the time to explain such an odd coincidence, I may have to discuss it with Nakamori-san."

"The usual place?" Kaito muttered. If Hakuba had his father's name, it would be child's play to notice that his death corresponded with the Kaitou Kid's mysterious disappearance…

xXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx

Saguru arched one blond eyebrow questioningly as Kuroba came out of the door to the roof of the school. Acknowledging that "the usual place" referred to the roof was tantamount to a confession in and of itself.

"What've you got?" Kaito asked calmly, his normally silly demeanour evaporated. Well, from what Saguru had deduced, there was nothing in this world more serious to him than this.

"I take it that that man… "Snake"… has been intending to see the Kaitou Kid dead for a very long time," he said, equally calm, "and succeeded nine years ago, though he thinks that he hasn't… it seems that, like the police, he thinks that the Kaitou Kid is the same one who first appeared nineteen years ago." He saw Kuroba's expression, always so controlled, flicker slightly at the mention of his father.

"_Well, it's not surprising that Kaito won't shut up about him, I guess," Aoko had muttered to Saguru when he had moved on past Kuroba. "Toichi-ojisan… he died nine years ago, I'm sure you've heard. It was such a blow to Kaito. Toichi-ojisan was just the whole world to him…_"

"_That's your job to find out, isn't it, Tantei-san?_"

"_That wasn't just a challenge, was it, Kuroba?"_ he thought, staring at the teen theif standing before him, hands in pockets, wearing no hat or monocle but still hidden behind a mask. "_You kept dropping clues… you wanted someone to find out. You wanted someone to validate you… because you don't want to be a criminal._"

"I suspect, from things that you've said, that you're looking for a specific jewel, as is he," Saguru continued. "By the way, just to confirm… no, I do not intend to arrest you at this precise moment in time if you validate anything that I have said. Murderers take priority over thieves. Just tell me: is your life in danger?"

"Only if they catch me," Kuroba said, his cheeky grin flashing past for a second again. "Hakuba… I'm not backing down with this. They won't get away with murder."

"Somehow I didn't expect you to," Saguru sighed. "But for the sake of catching murderers, I'm proposing a temporary truce."

"Fine…" Kuroba looked a little shifty for a moment. "So… was it you that got me out of there last night? I mean, I think I blacked out, but when I woke up I was home…"

"Not exactly…" Saguru couldn't help quirking a little smile. "You were acting rather… odd, however. More so than usual. You fought him off and flew away… but you were using some bizarre moves… moving oddly…"

"Like a f… fi… you know?" Kuroba said sharply, though he still didn't seem capable of saying the word. Saguru thought of the strange was that Kuroba's body had twisted and flipped.

"Fish?" he said, just for the guilty pleasure of watching Kuroba wince at the mere word. "Pretty much. Explanation? Please?"

"Well… you clearly noticed that I don't like… _them_," Kuroba said uncomfortably. "When I was really little, see… I think I was about three or four… we used to travel for Tou-san's magic shows. We were in China, and I was bored so I sneaked off, and I ran into this little boy a couple of years older than me. He was covered in bites and scratches. Can't remember his name, but he said he was travelling with his tou-san too, learning Karate. He said he knew a special martial art that he could teach me… the only problem was that he didn't have any cats…"

"_Cats?_" Saguru thought in confusion.

"… So instead, once he'd wrapped me in sausages, he threw me in the shark tank at the local aquarium."

Saguru felt that his eyes must be bugging out of his head. "_Shark_ tank?!" he yelped in surprise.

"Which is why I don't like… _them_," Kuroba said with a shiver.

"Understandable," Saguru agreed. "More so than you normally are."

"But I guess it works," Kuroba said with a shrug. "My fear of fish peaked… so I resorted to Fish-Fu to escape. I think that's one of the many skills of the Kaitou Kid that I won't share with the world…"

xXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx

xXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXxXx

_In Ranma ½, the protagonist, Ranma, was taught a deadly martial art called "Cat-Fu" as a child, through the bizarre training regimen of being wrapped in various fish and meats and thrown into a pit of hungry cats, creating a terrible fear of cats. Whenever his fear peaked, he would "become" a cat, with increased flexibility and dexterity, the ability to shred anything like tissue paper with his fingernails, a fondness for licking himself and curling up on people's (generally Akane's) laps in between fights, and developed a strange reaction to catnip. He would eventually revert to a human with no memory of what had happened when he was a cat. The rest of the time, he can't get near a cat… rather like Kaito can't get near a fish XD_

Of course I don't own Magic Kaito, Detective Conan or Ranma ½! Please, Aoyama-sensei, Takahashi-sensei, don't set the lawyers on me… keep them away… please… PLEASE! AAAAGHHHH! *reverts to lawyer-fu and smacks them all with a briefcase*


End file.
